Nancy Waring encourages students to get to know their own minds. A longtime mindfulness meditator and mindfulness-based stress reduction teacher, Waring is among a growing number of educators focused on contemplative studies. Besides mentoring SDMD students in contemplative subject areas, she designed and teaches the interdisciplinary graduate course, "Mindfulness and Professional Practice." Waring has a particular interest in the effects of meditation on the brain, and studies of neuroscience of meditation.

A life-long learner like many of her students, Waring has wide-ranging scholarly interests, including mind-body matters, the psychology of wellness and illness, integrative and allopathic medicine (particularly brain science and the history of medicine), Buddhism, social justice, women in conflict with the law, literary studies, and creative non-fiction.

Waring's career has spanned academia and journalism; she has been a writer, editor, and writing teacher for 30 years. She served as editor-in-chief of the Harvard Law Bulletin and deputy executive editor of Hippocrates, a primary care journal for physicians. At Hippocrates, she contributed many feature articles about leaders in mind/body and integrative medicine, as well as allopathic medicine. Formerly a frequent contributor to the Boston Sunday Globe Magazine, Waring has also written for The Village Voice, Natural Health, Women and Crime, and Shambhala Sun Magazine. She is currently writing a memoir.

In 1994, Waring helped found a home in Cambridge for formerly homeless women with HIV/AIDS, where she facilitates a weekly support group. She has received several awards recognizing her HIV/AIDS work, including the Cambridge Peace Commission's Peace and Justice Award.